Millennium Development Goals

The Millennium Development Goals (MDG’s) have produced the most successful anti-poverty movement in history and will serve as the jumping-off point for the new sustainable development agenda to be adopted this year.

The review of the MDG’s found that the 15-year effort to achieve the eight aspirational goals set out in the Millennium Declaration in 2000 was largely successful across the globe, while acknowledging shortfalls that remain. The data and analysis presented in the report show that with targeted interventions, sound strategies, adequate resources and political will, even the poorest can make progress.

The final MDG report, which can be found here, confirms that goal-setting can lift millions of people out of poverty, empower women and girls, improve health and well-being, and provide vast new opportunities for better lives.

“Eradicating extreme poverty continues to be one of the main challenges of our time, and is a major concern of the international community. Ending this scourge will require the combined efforts of all, governments, civil society organizations and the private sector, in the context of a stronger and more effective global partnership for development. The Millennium Development Goals set timebound targets, by which progress in reducing income poverty, hunger, disease, lack of adequate shelter and exclusion — while promoting gender equality, health, education and environmental sustainability — can be measured. They also embody basic human rights — the rights of each person on the planet to health, education, shelter and security. The Goals are ambitious but feasible and, together with the comprehensive United Nations development agenda, set the course for the world’s efforts to alleviate extreme poverty by 2015. ”
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon

Highlights from review of the MDG’s

The number of people now living in extreme poverty has declined by more than half, falling from 1.9 billion in 1990 to 836 million in 2015.

The number of people in the working middle class—living on more than $4 a day—nearly tripled between 1991 and 2015.

The proportion of undernourished people in the developing regions dropped by almost half since 1990.

The number of out-of-school children of primary school age worldwide fell by almost half, to an estimated 57 million in 2015, down from 100 million in 2000.

Gender parity in primary school has been achieved in the majority of countries.

The mortality rate of children under-five was cut by more than half since 1990.

Since 1990, maternal mortality fell by 45 percent worldwide.

Over 6.2 million malaria deaths have been averted between 2000 and 2015.

New HIV infections fell by approximately 40 percent between 2000 and 2013.

By June 2014, 13.6 million people living with HIV were receiving antiretroviral therapy (ART) globally, an immense increase from just 800,000 in 2003.

Between 2000 and 2013, tuberculosis prevention, diagnosis and treatment interventions saved an estimated 37 million lives.

Worldwide 2.1 billion people have gained access to improved sanitation.